d i khan
Dera of death
Opposing religious extremist groups have a history of killing each other
By Javed Aziz Khan in Peshawar and Qayyum Nawaz Baber in D I Khan
Located on the borders of Punjab, the southern Dera Ismail Khan district of NWFP proves to be a gateway from the troubled Waziristan Agencies to the rest of the country. Apart from sectarian violence and militancy, the region has seen several incidents of target killings in the last two and half years. Between January 2007 and July 2009, some 201 people were gunned down and another 428 wounded in separate incidents. The most common reason cited for killing has been rivalry between two religious groups, both hiring assassins to target their 'enemies'.

lahore
Quick-fix solutions
The public want instant justice; the police play on their psyche
By Waqar Gillani
The reason to kill is different in Punjab, the most thickly populated province of the country. Here, the ratio of killing of robbers and criminals in 'encounters' is alarmingly high as compared to the other three provinces. The human rights bodies consider these 'encounters' as extra judicial killings that bypass the role of judiciary in the name of quick justice.

It is a folly to assume nothing works in this country. Certain things work to their utmost precision, like target killings.

The grounds of killing may be different: they may be ethnic or sectarian like in Quetta, Karachi or Dera Ismail Khan; in some cases the police may decide to eliminate hardened criminals who manage to bypass the law of the land in the name of police encounters. The strategy may differ too. It could be armed men on motor cycles or cars or even suicide bombers as we have seen in D.I. Khan or policemen in uniform.

Broadly, target killings are the order of the day in certain cities in Pakistan. Actually, cities specialise in a certain kind of target. In many cases, such killings are pursued on more than one ground. So, in a city like Quetta, one witnesses examples of both sectarian and ethnic killings. The number of people killed is alarming. According to independent sources, in Balochistan alone, 280 people have become victims of target killing between January to August 2009.

The disastrous statistics point at the helplessness of the law enforcers as well as the people, the failure of the criminal justice system and criminalisation of institutions like the police as well as the political parties.

As the country is in the grip of successive attacks by militants, we decide to pick up another subject for a Special Report. We want to see how certain cities have come to represent one particular example of target killing that has gone on unabated for years. Of course the inability of the law enforcers and intelligence agencies to apprehend or curb this trend continues and hence their response to the audacious attacks by militants.

But specifically we want to focus on target killings. We want to see why political party workers are being picked up to be killed in Karachi with impunity as are Punjabis in Balochistan. D.I. Khan has been a classic case where all modes of killing have been used to kill sectarian opponents.

Interesingly, D.I. Khan has seen some success in the last couple of months and there is a lull in killings for now. Other cities may like to follow its lead and see how the law enforcers got together with the political leadership to achieve the desired results.

Over to target killings Karachi, Quetta, Lahore and D.I. Khan and what may be the best way to deal with them.

Karachi recently saw a spate of target killings that had surged mid-year and dropped only after top officials from Sindh and the federal government intervened. Interior Minister Rehman Malik, Sindh Home Minister Zulfiqar Mirza and Chief Minister Sindh Qaim Ali Shah condemned the attacks and ordered judicial enquiries in order to determine who the perpetrators were and why these incidents had occurred. While dozens of families grieved over the corpses of their near and dear ones, almost all the affected political parties expressed their anger over the extrajudicial murders of their workers.

According to data collected by Geo TV Crime Desk, around 604 were killed in 2008 -- comprising mostly political party workers and some policemen. From January to October 2009, another 158 political activists have been killed.

The month of June was the bloodiest for the workers of Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) and Mohajir Qaumi Movement (Haqiqi), not counting many who belonged to Mohajir Qaumi Movement (Aamir Khan) group, a splinter faction of Haqiqi.

On June 8, 2009, at least eleven people were shot dead in separate incidents, including an important member of MQM-H, their chief of Lawyers' Wing, Salimuddin alias Salim Knight who was killed in his house by unknown men. At least three workers from MQM were shot dead that night while Haqiqi claimed a total of nine, including Salim Knight. Such target killings are bound to cause further distress among the masses in a city that never sees the end of violence.

On the other hand, motives for these killings appear to be even more complicated and there is always something beyond what meets the eye. Waseem Ahmed, Capital City Police Officer (CCPO), Karachi, has an explanation: "It is all in-fighting.

"These people have issues with each other. We saw a lot of such incidents in the months of May, June and July this year, but until the top leadership intervened, these did not cease to be."

September and October have seen killings, too. The Edhi statistics quote gunshot deaths of 32 people in the month of September, while a host of party workers have been killed in the current month, too.

"What can a judicial probe do now?" asks Waseem Ahmed. "That time is over. Basically, the victims belonged to MQM and MQM-H, while those of ANP and PPP followed. And although the workers of Jeay Sindh and Sindh Taraqi Pasand Party were also killed, they were fewer in number."

Media reports reveal that the workers of religious parties, such as Sipah Sahaba Pakistan (SSP), Sunni Tehreek (ST) and even Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) have also been killed in different incidents in the city. Engineer Ilyas Zubair Advocate, the Sindh President of SSP, claims that around 10 to 12 of their workers were killed over the past year, including top leaders like Hafiz Amanullah, their legal advisor.

"On one or two occasions while we were burying the deceased party workers, our funeral procession was fired at," Waseem adds. "We are the victims but we are made out to be terrorists by the media and the government. Let me say once and for all that Iran and India in connivance with the US are behind these incidents; they want to destabilise the country."

Waseem also puts the blame on "groups like Sipah-e-Mohammad that enjoy the patronage of parties like MQM".

While MQM-Aamir Khan has not lost too many of its workers, they too have been targeted. Kamran Rizvi, a top party member, recalls, "Recently, we were at the funeral of a party member when we got the news that another of our member had been killed in another part of the city.

"Karachi has become a complete no-go area since the 1990s and nothing is being done about it. There is no judicial probe into the killings. It's time we stopped blaming foreign elements and took stock of the situation on home front."

Faisal Sabzwari, MPA, blames the "elements that want to destabilise the country". "By targeting Karachi, they are targeting the entire economic and political fabric of Pakistan. It is not just that these elements are trying to hit at the coalition of MQM and PPP. Their target is the entire country."

However, Shamshad Ghauri of MQM-H has different reasons to offer. "There has been news of Altaf Hussain wanting to accommodate us in his party once again. But MQM is divided over this issue and the opponents are carrying out these killings in order to deter us," he says. "I know this for sure because Altaf Hussain talked to our party leader Afaq Ahmed, but the latter refused to hold talks while he was still in jail."

Shamshad remembers how once as he was heading back home from Karachi Press Club with fellow party members when "suddenly we were besieged by armed men who had their faces covered. They fired at us, injuring one of our men. But our workers' medico-legal report was never filed and the police never let us nominate anyone. In fact, at the very scene of the crime, the Rangers had clearly spotted the armed men but they refused to do anything about it saying they did not have the orders."

According to Shamshad, since January this year, at least 35 of his party workers have been killed, including women. Meanwhile, though the police version gives a simplistic and even perhaps a superficial point of view of the motives of these killings, a more in-depth analysis is given by Fateh Burfat, Chairman, Criminology Department, University of Karachi: "Since the 1980s, the distinction between political parties and criminal groups has become blurred. This means that all of the political parties in Pakistan have been habitual in absorbing or patronising criminal elements and, in turn, the criminals have been taking help from these parties. Their nexus has over the years resulted in a lot of violent activities. …The very first reason why target killings take place is that one party wants to show its strength. By using criminal elements they mastermind attacks on rival party's workers. The next day the attack is retaliated. It goes on like this. Secondly, most of our political parties have become fascist in nature and they are inspired from time to time to purge their party of 'unwanted elements'. This is done regularly and this may or may not be made to show that it is done by their rival party. Sometimes the parties even disown their workers."

Burfat says the failure of the criminal justice system together with the lack of good policing have caused the state of affairs to worsen. "If the family of a party worker wants to file an FIR against the perpetrators, the police are not game; they'd want it to be filed against 'unknown' people, so that if an investigation has to be made, it can't possibly be.

"We all know that international and local hands are behind these killings. How else do they have a moving target killed with such precision? Most of the killed are found to have received bullets in their heads, and this is not the job of an ordinary shooter. I wonder where these unknown elements are getting their training from."

Being an 'international city', Karachi instantly draws the attention of foreign media to incidents of target killings and terrorist attacks. That is why, the city is often the epicenter of these incidents," says Burfat.

quetta

Balochistan has seen a sharp spike in incidents of target killings recently, especially since 2003. According to a senior official of the provincial government, there are two types of target killings -- one is sectarian and the other is backed by insurgent or separatist groups. In all of the reported incidents, the people -- belonging to different walks of life -- were found to have been fired into the scalp by highly professional, trained shooters. Yet none of the murderer was arrested. In fact, after every incident, the government of Balochistan and the police came out with hollow reassurances that the "culprits would be arrested soon".

Although the government has deployed Frontier Corps (FC) in Quetta city in order to check the situation, no major change is on view. Major General Saleem Nawaz, IG, FC, tells TNS that the law and order situation has improved considerably since the FC took charge.

Mir Zafarullah Khan Zehri, provincial Home Minister, on a point of order in Balochistan Assembly some time back, said that he was well aware of the people who were involved in incidents of target killing but had no powers to take action against them.

Different government departments have compiled a report about the incidents of target killings and sent it to the Prime Minister's Secretariat and the Interior Ministry. The report says that the escalating incidents of target killings in Balochistan, from January 01 till August 31, 2009, speaks volumes of the fact that something has to be done immediately in this regard. It brings to notice 301-odd incidents in which 280 people were killed and 672 injured. Most of these incidents, reportedly, occurred at night time.

An HRCP report, on the other hand, talks of 398 target killing incidents (from Jan 1 on) in which 278 people were killed and 874 injured. The 19 sectarian incidents reported claimed the lives of 34 people. In 64 other such incidents, 35 policemen were killed and 91 of them injured. In yet another series of incidents, 31 personnel of the Frontier Corps (FC) were killed and 38 injured.

The Hazara community in Quetta claims that over 270 of its people have been killed in the last six years.

"We strongly condemn the ethnic and sectarian killings," said Asma Jahangir, Chairperson, HRCP, in a press conference held last week in Quetta. "The common man of Balochistan should not be made to pay for the federal government's blunders. What has he (the common man) done to deserve this?"

Most of the victims of these target killings are the Hazaras and the Punjabis, generally known as settlers. For instance, in Quetta and other Baloch-dominated areas of Balochistan, Punjabi barbers and labourers have been pet preys. Recently, a few teachers of Punjabi origin, including high-profile educationists, were also killed, further increasing the sense of insecurity among the settlers of other communities in what is Pakistan's largest (area-wise) province. The height of fear is such that majority of the settlers or non-local professional like doctors, educationists, engineers and businessmen have left the city for safer places. The professors and lecturers of the University of Balochistan are said to have applied for NOCs for other provinces. Though, the university administration has banned the issuance of NOCs to keep their staff from leaving the institution.

A top police official tells TNS that the investigations into the incidents of violence and terrorism are underway. He is not loath to admit that no achievement whatsoever, regarding the arrests of the criminals, has been made so far. He speaks of the lists in which some 400 accused have been nominated in different incidents of target killings.

Dr Farrukh, Superintendent of Police, Quetta, says the police have arrested four high profile killers. He puts the blame of the target killing incidents on the defunct religious organisation, Lashkar-e-Jhangvi.

Pashtoons, Baloch and some religious groups also condemn such incidents. Senator Mir Hasil Khan Bizenjo of National Party says his party is against all kinds of target killings including sectarian and ethnic. The Balochistan Assembly has already adopted a resolution, in condemnation of the target killings of Hazara tribesmen and settlers, and demanded of the government to arrest those involved.

Hafiz Hamdullah, Deputy Secretary General, JUI-F, says the party leadership was the first to raise its voice against such incidents. "We have launched massive campaigns, too," he adds.

As the crisis deepens, business activities experience a greater slump in the capital of Balochistan. "Our business has collapsed due to lawlessness in the city. The government is oblivious to our grievances," says Haji Ashiq Achakzai, a Quetta-based businessman.

On the other hand, the medical doctors and psychiatrists in the city report an alarming rise in the number of patients suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

d i khan

Located on the borders of Punjab, the southern Dera Ismail Khan district of NWFP proves to be a gateway from the troubled Waziristan Agencies to the rest of the country. Apart from sectarian violence and militancy, the region has seen several incidents of target killings in the last two and half years. Between January 2007 and July 2009, some 201 people were gunned down and another 428 wounded in separate incidents. The most common reason cited for killing has been rivalry between two religious groups, both hiring assassins to target their 'enemies'.

One of the recently arrested hired assassins confessed to have killed 11 people from the rival sect in nine separate incidents. Another, now behind the bars, confessed to have shot dead five persons, assisted other shooters in 21 incidents and planned 39 more killings.

D I Khan has a long history of sectarian violence where extremist groups of two religious sects, Sunnis and Shias, have been killing each other for the past many decades. It was the only district in the Frontier that would witness curfew almost every year, especially during the month of Moharram. More trouble was in store for the residents of Dera when militants from the South and North Waziristan spilled over into the district to escape military operation. Terror struck the city hard in 2004, explosions and rocket attacks now being the order of the day. The residence of the chief of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam Fazl (JUI-F), Maulana Fazlur Rahman, belonging to D I Khan, also came under a rocket attack.

It was probably due to a spillover of militancy as well as a lack of good administration that target killing recorded a steep rise in the town later and it continues to do so. In April last, at least six people were killed and three others wounded in a renewed spate of target killings on a single day. Those killed included a newly married couple, a schoolteacher and two security guards. In another incident, Javed Baqir -- senior leader of the Pakistan Peoples Party D I Khan chapter -- and his spouse were shot dead. In a crackdown launched after the ugly incidents, police rounded up 72 suspects from different parts of the district. The practice, however, did not end. Shooters continued to kill people from the two religious sects almost every day and the police seemed helpless in bringing an end to the violence.

Maulana Fazlur Rahman came forward and called a 'jirga' of both the sects and other concerned people. A six-point formula was signed at the jirga held at Circuit House and all the participants promised to discourage target killing and to utilise their resources. Handing over of some 36 people wanted in incidents of target killings was also promised. But the moot failed. The snipers shot a trader in Commissionary Market only a few hours after the deal was inked.

On August 19, 2008, a suicide bomber blew himself up in a hospital waiting room, killing 32 people, including seven police officers who had been deployed to guard a local. The dead included 20 members of a single family.

On November 21 last year, Allama Nazir Hussain Shah, a religious leader, was shot dead in a horrific incident of sectarian killing, along with a friend, Shah Iqbal Hussain. While his funeral prayers were being said, a suicide bomber blew himself up, killing nine people and injuring 39. Again, on February 20, 2009, a suicide bomber blew himself up in the funeral procession of a Shia local, killing more than 32 people and injuring 157. Another bomber struck inside the hujra of a political leader from the adjoining Bhakkar district of Punjab, who was being blamed for supporting the Shia sect. The sect people retaliated violently to the suicide bombings and killing of their men.

Not only were the people from Punjab blamed for supporting the Shia sect, an organisation based in Parachinar was also said to be providing shooters to their men in Dera.

On the other hand, support was coming to the Sunnis from the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) in Waziristan. So the incidents of target killing continued on.

The practice was at its peak in the months of April, May, June and July, something which forced the government to take some 'bold' steps in terms of making changes in the administration, for a permanent end to the killings. The vital change that was introduced was the replacement of the police chief of the district with Gul Afzal Afridi who had previously served two terms in the volatile district and delivered to a great extent.

Afridi was the choice of the chief minister, the governor and the top military leadership in the region. The change in the administration worked this time. Enjoying the complete backing of the government and the army, the cops in Dera Ismail Khan first dismantled a training camp of the Shia sect in the area. The flow of Taliban to support the Sunni sect was completely blocked and top leadership of the extremist groups of both the sects was put behind the bars.

"We arrested countless shooters from both the groups and they have confessed their involvement in incidents before the court. We also detected their codes to know about the individuals and networks that were launching them," says DPO D I Khan.

Police normally need latest weapons, APCs and money to be spent on information collection in such extraordinary situations. The morale of the force is restoring gradually after they remained in grip of fear, also from the powerful rival sects, for years. The force is resisting every kind of pressure from the politicians in the district, some of whom are allegedly supporting their sects with finances and other means. The masses are happy for as long as the region is free of such incidents, which is the case for the past almost three months now. The last incident reported took place on July 29 inside the district bar.

"We are all prayers for those who've made efforts to restore peace to our phullan wala shehr (the city of flowers). The public has nothing to do with politics; they just want security for their lives, families and properties," says Imran Waheed, a Gomal University student.

Imran says the public will definitely help the police force and the army if they continue to deliver.

The people in Dera as well as Hangu district and the tribal Kurram Agency have always demanded peace and security which has been a hard task for the governments. So far, calm prevails in D I Khan but permanent peace could be ensured only when the political heavyweights, intelligentsia, police and public of the area discourage the extremist elements. Maulana Fazlur Rahman, Deputy Speaker Faisal Karim Kundi, Murid Kazim, Miankhels and the family of late Inayatullah Khan Gandapur can play a pivotal role in ensuring peace in Dera on permanent basis. More support to the administration of the district from the federal and provincial governments in completely wiping out extremist elements from the city will also be helpful in ending the menace of target killings for ever.

The reason to kill is different in Punjab, the most thickly populated province of the country. Here, the ratio of killing of robbers and criminals in 'encounters' is alarmingly high as compared to the other three provinces. The human rights bodies consider these 'encounters' as extra judicial killings that bypass the role of judiciary in the name of quick justice.

Though such encounters are reported in other parts of the country, too, the number of encounters in Punjab, between January 2009 and the first week of October, is not less than 265 against 49 in Sindh, 32 in NWFP and four in Balochistan during the same period. In Punjab, more than 50 policemen have also been killed while encountering the resistance posed by the criminals. However, it is generally believed that many of these encounters are fake and a plan to do 'quick justice'.

The Punjab police officers, informally and anonymously talking to TNS, say that these encounters should be fairly probed. But they also wonder what else can be done when the criminals could always be acquitted by the court because of lack of evidence or a weak criminal justice system.

Reports have it that the police have 'high level' verbal instructions to kill all criminals when they show even some resistance. However, Rana Sanaullah Khan, Punjab Law Minister, tells TNS that these are not extra judicial killings but encounters after the criminals resisted or opened fire at the police. "We are investigating every encounter and if there is an act of vengeance the police officer involved would be taken to task."

He also calls on the public to lodge complaints before the government if they have any.

The various human rights bodies in the country have always protested the police readiness to skip legal and judicial procedures and inflict a deadly assault on a random law-breaker.

According to the provincial police's own reported figures in the national press, as many as 66 alleged criminals were killed in the year 2008, in 42 police encounters in Lahore alone.

Asma Jahangir, Chairperson, Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) says the Commission is compiling the data of all encounters and extra judicial killings happening across the country. "Such killings in the name of quick justice will remain doubtful unless there is a fair and transparent probe into them. The Punjab government has always made announcements of conducting inquiries but not even a single inquiry report (of an encounter) has ever been made public. These things raise doubts in the minds of the people."

She says the criminals also have the right to defend themselves in the court; "that is why, we need an improved prosecution and criminal justice system".

The same pattern was witnessed in the previous regime of Shahbaz Sharif. Reportedly, during the last tenure of the sitting Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif (1997 to 1999), more than 850 suspected criminals were killed in what the human rights activists then called 'extra-judicial killings'.

"Encounters have failed to deter crime. We need police and judicial reforms in the province for that," says Azmat Abbas, a senior journalist.

He also terms such killings as extra judicial. "It seems the police has assumed the role of the judiciary, which is obviously wrong," he tells TNS.

"This is the Punjab police's usual way of 'going about' their job on the spot. They are encounter specialists, and even the encounters in other provinces are thanks to Punjabi police officers. It's the psyche of the public that they want quick justice. The police play on it. There could be a hundred ways to justify their act, but this is unlawful."

Abbas recalls how a Shia criminal, Mehram Ali, was hanged to death for killing his opposing sect's people after which we have not seen any Shia terrorist. Likewise, Riaz Basra, the Shia killer who was active in the late 1980s and early 90s, was killed in a police encounter which enraged the people of his sect and they ended up taking law into their own hands.

"The need of the day is not only changes in the criminal justice but also improvement in the efficiency of the police and the bureaucracy."

Interestingly, the public, especially the families of the victims, are also often found to be supportive of such 'quick-fix' killings. The print ads given by the families of the victims who were agonised by the targeted criminals famously express their gratitude to the Punjab police for perpetrating justice on their behalf.

Tasneem Noorani, former interior secretary of Pakistan, believes that if the criminals pose resistance or open fire at the police, the encounter becomes justified, otherwise it would fall in the jurisdiction of 'extra judicial killing'.

However, he admits he has no knowledge whether the rapidly increasing encounters in Punjab, or in other parts of the country, could be regarded 'extra judicial killings'.

Noorani seconds Azmat Abbas, saying the bureaucracy would have to act properly if it was serious about a long-term solution to the problem.

"Today, I see a lot of frustration in the society regarding issues of justice. In our society, there is always a great chance that the culprits will not be arrested or, if they are arrested, they will be bailed out and, ultimately, be acquitted for want of evidence. Bureaucracy and police both have a great role to play in this."

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